Caesar. Life of a Colossus (Adrian Goldsworthy) Yale University Press (64 page)

356

P a r t t h r e e

O

DICTATORSHIP

49 – 44 BC

XVII

The Road to

the Rubicon

‘Then, catching up with his cohorts at the river Rubicon, the point at which his province ended, he paused for a moment, and understanding what a huge thing he was planning, he turned and spoke to the men with him. “Even now we could turn back; but once we cross that tiny bridge, then everything will depend on armed force.”’
–Suetonius, late first
century AD.
1

‘All this has made him [Caesar] so powerful, that the only hope of standing up to him rests on one citizen [Pompey]. I really wish that the latter had not given him so much power in the first place, rather than waiting till he was strong before fighting him.’ –
Cicero, 9 December 50 BC.
2

Gaul had provided Caesar with glory and wealth. By 50 BC there was no serious fighting and there was every indication that the series of devastating defeats inflicted on each rebellion had combined with the careful diplomatic efforts of the proconsul to create a stable new province for the Republic. The willingness of the vast majority of the tribal leaders to accept Roman rule was not just a question of personal loyalty to Caesar. His murder six years later did not provoke fresh outbreaks of unrest in Gaul. Like any other successful Roman commander he had reaped great personal benefits from his victories, but this should not obscure the gains his conquests had brought to Rome. Formally, the Republic now had a new source of revenue, although this had to balanced against the costs of garrisoning the province. Transalpine Gaul and the important land routes to Spain were secured, while Italy itself was now much better shielded from invasion by northern tribes following in the footsteps of the Cimbri and Teutones. There was no imminent threat to Italy from this direction, and such strategic concerns were not foremost in 358

The R oad to the Rubicon

Caesar’s mind when he initiated his campaigns. Yet they were no less real for all that and it was undeniable that in this respect the conquest of Gaul was beneficial to Rome. However, throughout history expansion has tended to benefit individuals far more than states, and this was certainly true of Roman imperialism. Trade with Gaul was important before Caesar’s arrival, but his campaigns helped to open up new markets – for instance in Britain – to Roman merchants and allowed them to operate in very favourable conditions in the new province of Gaul. Fortunes were made even more rapidly by Caesar’s senior officers and staff, who shared in his generous distributions of plunder and slaves. He was also not one to hoard his own new-found wealth, but spent lavishly on his building projects and planned entertainments, and at a more personal level offered interest free loans or even gifts of money to men he wished to cultivate. Many Romans who had never been anywhere near Gaul gained from its conquest.

There were benefits to the Republic – and even more to individuals – from the victories in Gaul, but all were dwarfed by the immediate and irrevocable change these brought to Caesar’s personal fortune and status. By 50 BC he was wealthier, had a more extensive network of friends and clients, and could boast of greater and more glorious achievements than any other senator except for Pompey. For several years he had made it clear that he intended to seek a second consulship on his return to Rome. His electoral success was virtually guaranteed, for he had always been popular with the voters and now had even more money with which to court their favour. Long established law, restated by Sulla during his dictatorship, decreed that a tenyear interval should elapse between consulships. This had been set aside in Pompey’s case in 52 BC, just one of many unorthodox steps in his career, but the law remained in force and Caesar had no desire or need for preferential treatment in this respect. He planned to put his name forward as a candidate for election in the autumn of 49 BC, to assume the consulship in January 48 BC, ten years after he had laid down the office at the end of his first term as consul. The controversies of that year still dogged him, and Caesar knew that he would be prosecuted as soon as he became a private citizen. For that reason he wished to go straight from his proconsular command into the second consulship. The law put forward by all ten tribunes of 52 BC – admittedly in at least one case after some initial reluctance – had granted him permission to become a candidate without actually entering the city in the normal way. Pompey and Crassus had done the same thing in 71 BC, waiting with their armies outside Rome and only crossing the formal boundary of the city when they actually assumed the consulship. Once he 359

CIVIL WAR AND DICTATORSHIP 49 – 44 BC

had become consul – ideally with a sympathetic colleague, perhaps even one of his own former legates such as Labienus – Caesar would be in a position to present new legislation, rewarding his veteran soldiers with land and confirming his settlement of Gaul. Other bills could have been tailored to add to his popularity with various sections of society. Back in the heart of public life, he would have had a year in which either to win over his political enemies or, at the very least, make himself so strong that they would not risk attacking him in the courts. We do not know what he planned after that, and it is more than possible that he had no clear idea himself at this stage and intended to await events. A fresh provincial command would have been one option, perhaps against the Parthians to avenge the stain of Crassus’

disastrous defeat at Carrhae. Alternatively, he may have hoped for some appointment similar to Pompey’s, allowing him to hold
imperium
and control legions while hovering just outside Rome.3

In the event, nothing worked out as Caesar had planned. Instead of coming back home to a second consulship, a Gallic triumph, games honouring his daughter and general acknowledgement as Pompey’s equal as the two foremost men in the Republic, he returned as a rebel. His opponents held very different ideas about the manner in which he should return, and so increasingly did Pompey. There were attempts at negotiation, many offers of compromise, but in the end it proved impossible to find a settlement that all were willing and able to accept. Stubbornness, pride and suspicion on all sides, as well as deep personal enmities in a few cases, all contributed to this impasse. So did misplaced optimism, leading to the belief that opponents would back down. Some had seen the possibility of civil war for more than a year before it actually broke out, but very few of the key participants actually wanted it. Most, including Caesar and Pompey, were gradually and reluctantly drawn into a situation in which they decided that they no longer had any other acceptable alternative. It would be very hard to say when war finally became inevitable. The Civil War was not fought over great issues or between conflicting ideologies, but was about personal position and
dignitas
–most of all that of Caesar. In later years, especially for men living under the rule of Rome’s emperors, some were inclined to see Caesar as aiming at revolution and monarchy from his early youth. No contemporary evidence supports such claims, while his actions certainly give no hint of such plans. A peaceful return to take up a pre-eminent position within the Republic, his prestige, influence and
auctoritas
acknowledged by all other senators, even those who disliked him, was what Caesar craved. Having to resort to armed force to protect his position was a sign of political failure, for Pompey as much as for Caesar.4

360

The R oad to the Rubicon

The Breakdown of an Alliance

The pressure on Caesar had built up gradually. When Cato had condemned his actions against the Usipetes and Tencteri in 55 BC, there had been no realistic prospect that the Senate would act upon his proposal and actually hand the proconsul over to the Germans. The triumvirate had been renewed at Luca and between them Pompey, Crassus and Caesar – especially the first two because they were actually in Rome – were too strong to oppose. Domitius Ahenobarbus could only be denied the consulship for a year, but his ambition to replace Caesar in the Gallic command was blocked without too much difficulty. The death of Julia weakened the bond between Caesar and Pompey. That of Crassus fundamentally shifted the balance of Roman public life, since so many leading men had been under obligation to him for past loans or favours. His surviving son Marcus was neither old enough nor able enough to step into his father’s shoes at the centre of this network of clients and political friends. Some of these men now attached themselves to Pompey and some to Caesar, but the bonds could not instantly become as strong as the ones to Crassus, who had devoted much effort over many years to expanding his political capital as much as his financial wealth. Many of the strongest critics of Caesar had also in the past been hostile to Pompey, which made his appointment as sole consul in 52 BC on the motion of Bibulus backed by Cato all the more striking. Cato did stress his continued personal independence, bluntly telling Pompey that he would advise him for the good of the Republic but that this did not imply any personal friendship between them. This no doubt contributed to his failure to gain the consulship. However, for the moment at least, Pompey, through his new marriage and willingness to restore order to the State, had become more acceptable to many of the leading men in the Senate. These liked to be known as the ‘good men’ (
boni
) – or sometimes the ‘best’ (
optimates
) – and came predominantly from very well-established families. In 52 BC they willingly supported Pompey as a means of dealing with the violence that was disrupting public life, especially since, apart from Milo, virtually all the casualties from the trials in the new court were partisans of Clodius. Cato had even said that Milo ought to be acquitted as one who had deserved well of the Republic for disposing of his dangerous rival.5

In 51 BC Marcus Claudius Marcellus was consul and began a concerted attack on Caesar, who was his personal enemy. The ultimate source of this hostility is obscure, though a major factor was doubtless the resentment of the virtual monopoly of grand and important commands held by the 361

CIVIL WAR AND DICTATORSHIP 49 – 44 BC

triumvirate. Under normal circumstances, such opportunities for serving the Republic and winning glory ought to have gone to men from the great aristocratic families – men like Marcellus himself, his brother and cousin. Pompey was too strong to attack at present, but Caesar appeared to be vulnerable. Marcellus openly declared his intention of having Caesar recalled from his command, arguing that his great victory over Vercingetorix, which the Republic had marked with a public thanksgiving, showed that the war in Gaul was now over. This justification was necessary, since in 55 BC Crassus’

and Pompey’s law had granted Caesar a new five-year command in Gaul. Marcellus also argued that Pompey’s more recent law concerning provincial commands superseded the tribunes’ law granting Caesar the privilege of becoming a candidate for his second consulship without actually returning to the city. As early as March Pompey expressed his disapproval of the consul’s intentions. Apart from his ties with Caesar, it was deeply insulting to have his own law challenged in this way, especially since clauses in the law itself had forbidden alteration of it by subsequent meetings of the Senate or Assembly. He made it clear that he would never support any move to have Caesar recalled before his legal term as proconsul had expired. In July questions were asked in the Senate about the legion that Pompey had ‘loaned’ to Caesar after the defeat of Cotta and Sabinus, and he was urged to take it back under his direct command. Grudgingly Pompey declared that he would do so, but refused to be coerced and set no date for recalling his troops. Marcellus kept up the pressure and, after a postponement, managed to ensure that the Senate would debate the matter of Caesar’s province on 1 September. The Senate met outside the formal boundary of the city, so that Pompey could once again be present. He again stated his view that it would not be proper for the Senate to rule on this question at the moment. His father-in-law Metellus Scipio did put forward a motion for the issue to be raised again on 30 March 50 BC, and it seems unlikely that Pompey disapproved of this. In fact Marcellus was able to secure a fuller debate much earlier than this on 29 September. Once again Pompey was present. Marcellus put forward a motion very similar to that of Scipio decreeing that the Senate should address the issue of the ‘consular provinces’

on or after 1 March. This was approved. Further measures, one to bar any tribune from vetoing the decision of that debate, and another to begin the process of discharging any of Caesar’s soldiers who had served for their full legal term – which at this period was most probably sixteen years – or had other grounds for honourable discharge were debated. Both of these proposals were vetoed by two or more tribunes, as was another dealing with 362

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appointments to propraetorian provincial commands that would also have affected the number of men waiting for commands when Caesar’s term expired.6

Marcellus had not won outright, but neither had he altogether lost. Caesar was still formally acknowledged as rightful governor of his three provinces when the consul laid down his office at the end of the year. Earlier in the year he had shown a sign of his frustration with working solely through the proper channels in the Senate. In 59 BC as part of his agrarian legislation Caesar had established a colony at Novum Comum in Cisalpine Gaul north of the River Po. Throughout his time in Gaul, he had also treated the Transpadanes as citizens even though they as yet had only Latin status. Marcellus ordered a former magistrate of the colony to be flogged, a punishment from which citizens were exempt, telling the man to go back to Caesar and ‘show him his stripes’. It was a crass act, which disgusted Cicero when he heard about it, and indicates just how bitterly Marcellus loathed Caesar. Even if he had not secured the proconsul’s recall, Marcellus had raised serious questions over his future. Some of Pompey’s comments during and after the debate on 29